Archive for May, 2020

When we came home from the Legends Rock paintings near Thermopolis, Wyoming, I was inspired to make my own version of the ‘quilt lady.’ The rock painting is larger than lifesize, but this one is a block print about 5 x 7,” printed on rust-dyed fabric that is not quite as red as the Wyoming rocks.

I have made a variety of goddess figures, too. Most of these are inspired by the drawings in Civilization of the Goddess: the World of Old Europe, by Marija Gimbutas. I’ve drawn the bird goddess on clay and wood. Recently, I made some simple white line woodcuts.

Here she is, with pearls.

The bird goddess works well for woodburning, too. Here she is on a maple burl vessel, with red oxide highlights.

Some of the other goddess from Gimbutas need a 3D presentation. I was lucky to get some red micaceous clay from Jennifer Hanson at Spinning Star studios for these three charming goddess figurines. There is a relatively clear consensus now that the earliest use of clay by humans was for figurative work.

Posted in archaeology, Clay | Comments Off on Discovering the very oldest part of ourselves